Kale Ayo to grace Nuela handball finals in Omu-Aran

Trophies at stake to be won in Omu-Aran

Kale Ayo and officials of Kwara state government...expected in this year's finals

*Winning national titles is our focus - Isiaka Atanda

Omu-Aran, the ancient Igbomina town, will be accommodating handball guests from the 1^st to 3^rd December when the finals of the 2016 Nuela Cadet championship for U-12 and U-15) will be played at the Government Secondary School.

Different schools in the state had competed for the championsips’ preliminaries which were zonally played across the state’s 16 local government councils. Six local government areas played in the pool producing the top four teams, two males and two females in the two categories.

All semi-final matches were also played in a round robin format to enable the teams have enough playing time and experience. The championship which is in the second edition is funded by the Nuela Group of companies.

Kwara state Commissioner for sports, Pharmacist Kale Ayo will be expected to be the special guest of honour in the state’s premier handball championship which has repeatedly brought honour and pride to the state in the last couple of six years.

Sharing the jys of winners in last year's final

The two finalists were yet to be determined as at when we went to press. Teams are involved in the tough battle to ensure they get to the finals and do not just their school but their local government councils and family proud. Handball has produced career prospects for great number of children in the state.

Speaking on phone, the coach coordinating the championship, Isiaka Atanda, he said, "first, our gratitude goes to the chairman of the state hanball Association, Mr Emmanuel Olubiyo for his well grounded faith in both the sport and the children who are benefitting from this championship.

Despite the economic recession in the country, he still had the space and resources to pump some money and insisted that this tournament must go on, we can't be less encouraged by him. Ironically, the standard exhibited by the participating schools has been so high. Even some of the schools that lost in the preliminary stages showed some high quality of talent. 

In all, we have enough room to pick the very best boys and girls from  the tournament that we can start to groom to esure we retain the national titles again this new handball season. Winning the national titles and getting the ticket to represent Nigeria is an ambition we have also raised here to justify all these investments.